"Serving West and East Village, Chelsea, SoHo, NoHo, Little Italy, Chinatown and the Lower East Side"

Volume 77, Number 21Oct. 31 - Nov. 06, 2007

Editorial/Op-EdPlugging the hole on illegal hotels In early October, there was a breakthrough in the battle by city officials and tenant advocates to stop landlords from turning their buildings into illegal hotels, with the citys first-ever injunction being slapped against one such owner. Yesterday, a State Supreme Court judge ruled, in a decision with citywide implications, that after Jan. 8, 2008, no units in this landlords three SROs can be rented to transients.

ObituariesGregory Dawson, 73, impresario, activist and artistBy Jerry Tallmer
Renaissance man is one of the most overworked phrases in the English language, but its what I cant help thinking about Gregory Dawson, the artist  to peg him to what he loved best  who died Sunday night, October 21, at New York Hospital, of liver failure and complications, at age 73.

James Savastano, Fire Department battalion chiefBattalion Chief James J. Savastano, commander of the Fourth Battalion, died suddenly of a heart attack on Oct. 9. He was 54. He was off duty and was running when he was stricken, according to a Fire Department spokesperson.

Delores Birdex, 77, artist and kids clothing designerBy Albert Amateau
Delores Birdex, an artist and clothing designer who lived in the Village as a young woman when she studied at the Art Students League, died Oct. 20 at the age of 77 in North Haven, Conn., where she lived for the past several years.

Sports

The benefits of horsing around without keeping scoreBy Judith Stiles
In Tall Pauls professional life he crunches numbers and analyzes performance data, not for stocks and bonds, but for thoroughbred racehorses. From his office on Varick St. and through the Web site thorograph.com, he searches for patterns that will help identify a horses particular form cycle in order to predict that horses likelihood of winning.

Dying to tell Treadwell tale at Merchants HouseBy Jefferson Siegel
As Halloween approaches, hauntings, costumes and parades usually supplant the common ghost story. At the East Villages Merchants House Museum, a candlelight tour gave visitors chills and maybe even a ghost sighting.

Village pizzerias dont pan outBy Kara Bloomgarden-Smoke and Lincoln Anderson
NoNo Gourmet, an upscale deli currently located at the corner of Horatio and Washington Sts., signed a lease a little over three weeks ago to open a second location at the corner of Charles and Washington Sts. The deli will open in the storefront recently vacated by Deliziosa Pizza.

City wont play nice with daycare, which files suitBy Albert Amateau
Childrens Liberation Daycare Center, whose 88 youngsters between the ages of 2 and 6 share the former P.S. 122 with three arts organizations, is going to court on Nov. 28 to plead for the space in the East Village building and adjacent play yard that they have used for the past 26 years.

St. Johns checking out hotel if Related gets Pier 40By Patrick Hedlund
The massive St. Johns building near the Hudson Square waterfront could possibly see a hotel or luxury condominiums rise above its roof depending on the outcome of negotiations over future development in the area, the propertys real estate director stated last week.

VILLAGER ART & LIFESTYLEElizabeth and the catapult to fameBy Lee Ann Westover
A Columbia Records A&R rep recently left a message for Elizabeth Ziman, the keyboardist and songwriter of Elizabeth and The Catapult. Hey Elizabeth, gimmie a call back. Just want to chat. She dialed him up, only to find him in a frantic mood. Elizabeth, sorry, Im going to have to call you back. About a million people are getting fired right now. Danny Molad, Catapults drummer and producer, sitting with Ziman at a café in Greenpoint last week, summed up the exchange with heavy sarcasm: Oh, thats promising.

Artists to walk in each others shoes, literallyBy Stephanie Murg
Ringing the doorbell to Nancy Webers Chelsea apartment may well change your life. Her cozy home on West 24th Street is the venue of Life Exchange, a performance art project that begins tonight and runs through November 6, during Performa07, the citys second visual art performance biennial.

Turning talk of Sudan to actionBy Steven Snyder
While the American government has increasingly turned a blind eye to the atrocities occurring in Sudan  the Bush administration debating for years whether to even term the countrys mass killings genocide, much less get involved with the conflict  American movie theaters have, in recent years, taken a far more active role in exposing the subject to increasingly appalled and outraged audiences.

Hanging with the poets below 14th StreetBy Stephen Wolf
Ed.s Note: Lower East Side resident Stephen Wolf is the editor of the recently released poetry anthology I Speak of the City: Poems of New York (Columbia University Press). Below is his personal introduction to the book, written expressly for The Villager.

NEWSPathmark closing talk registers L.E.S. panicBy Julie Shapiro
It looks like the Cherry St. Pathmark will soon be closing, and from the aisles to the parking lot, thats all shoppers are talking about. I heard from people who work there, said Renee Silverberg, who was pushing a cart of groceries out of the store last Monday morning.

Hamlet has a dilemma at Seravalli PlaygroundBy Phil F. Kropoth
It was 10 a.m. on a Friday, and Hamlet, the wire fox terrier, knew it. He let out a wide yawn that stretched his jaw past 90 degrees. With sleepy eyes, he watched cars pass on Eighth Ave., waiting outside a cafe for his owner Mark Leydorf.

Capital occasion for federal row housesBy Patrick Hedlund
The city approved landmarking for two 19th-century row houses in Hudson Square last week, the City Council announced, agreeing with a unanimous vote by the Landmarks Preservation Commission in July to designate the historic properties at 488 and 486 Greenwich St.

Board 3 area is being flooded by water-main breaksBy Clark Merrefield
From a hairline fracture to a severe crack, water mains in Community Board 3s Lower East Side and Chinatown have broken more times this year  15  than in any other community board district in Manhattan, according to city statistics.

BIDs make emergencies their businessThe Flatiron/23rd Street Partnership and Union Square Partnership, two local business improvement districts, are inviting area property owners, business owners and managers to a free breakfast event on Thurs., Nov. 1, from 8:30 a.m. to 10 a.m. at Baruch Colleges Vertical Campus, 55 Lexington Ave. at 24th St. (enter on 24th St.), 14th-floor conference center, room 14-220.

VILLAGER ART & LIFESTYLEDance at the gymBy Brian McCormick
Sports are a huge part of American culture, much more so than the oftentimes exclusionary contemporary dance world. Still, the two have much in common  movement, patterns, time-based performance, teamwork, and determinate objectives.

Koch on FilmBy Ed KochElizabeth: The Golden Age (-) This is one of the most boring movies you will ever see. The picture recounts the period of Queen Elizabeths (Cate Blanchett) middle age and the Spanish Armada sailing against England to wrest control of the kingdom from the Protestant Queen Elizabeth and turn it over to the Catholic Mary, Queen of Scots (Samantha Morton).Sleuth (+) The two characters in this film are Andrew Wyke (Michael Caine), an older well-known writer and cuckold husband of a woman having an affair with Milo Tindle (Jude Law), a male hairdresser/actor who is much younger than her husband.

Karen Finleys wake up callBy Jerry Tallmer
Midway through opening night of her new two-part performance piece, Karen Finley broke off, marched into the audience to look at something that was disturbing her, then returned to the microphone with an apology: I have post-traumatic stress from John Frohnmayer.